The boys in the room didn’t know what to make of her at first. Hell, he didn’t know what to make of her either. She walked into the room in a gray three-piece suit—slim at the waist, shoulder pads sharp enough to draw blood, slacks pressed like military lines. Her shoes were shiny, pointed. The kind of woman who took up space not by being loud, but by making you shut up. And the rings. Thick silver bands that clinked when she crossed her arms. She didn't wear perfume, but there was something distinct about her, like cool metal and menthol and maybe the smell of ink on a signed contract.

She made him nervous, and Elvis didn’t get nervous around women often.

And yet, somehow, the moment she stepped into the role, everything in his world—his chaotic, bloated, spiraling world—clicked into place. No more mystery checks going out, no more double-booked hotels or "accidental" meet-and-greets when he just wanted to eat. She handled it all with this eerie precision, cutting through the mess like a scalpel through soft fruit. One phone call, one pointed stare, and people obeyed.

She didn’t yell. That was the unnerving part. Even when someone messed up, all it took was her leaning in slightly, tilting her head just so, and asking a question like, “Is that how you want to be remembered?” And suddenly the grown men in suits were stammering like children caught with stolen candy.

Elvis watched her once from the back of the room while she was speaking with a press rep—grilling was more like it, but with that calm, smirking expression on her face that made it feel like a chess game, not an argument. She wore a jet-black suit that day with a crisp white shirt, rings gleaming as she turned a pen between her fingers. Her hair was tucked back tight. Her mouth twitched when the man across from her started to sweat. She winked, stood, and the conversation was over.

And Elvis? He was half in love with her and half terrified.

Not that he’d ever say that out loud.

She had this way of looking at him sometimes—after he made some silly little comment to get her to smile, or after he nailed a rehearsal he hadn’t been able to focus on the day before. She’d just cock a brow, let a smirk slide across her face, and then go right back to business. And that wink? The first time she aimed it at him, he was stunned speechless for a solid ten seconds, holding his water bottle like it might give him advice. It wasn’t flirtation, not exactly. It was... dominion. The kind of gesture that said: I know what I’m doing. Do you?

She knew things about him. Things no one had taught her. How to speak to him in clipped sentences when his nerves were fried, how to draw the blinds and hand him sunglasses when the light hurt his eyes. How to ask the real questions when she saw that look in his face—that quiet, aching look that no one else ever seemed to catch.

She didn’t coddle. She didn’t ask twice. And when she stood beside him in those fancy suits, sharp and commanding and cool as the other side of the pillow, he felt a strange sense of safety. Like someone had him. Not as a product. Not as a brand. As a person.

That night, they were in the upstairs den at Graceland. He had his guitar in his lap, strumming mindlessly, and she was going over schedules, shifting paperwork with swift, gloved hands. The ring on her index finger caught the lamplight as she wrote something in the margin. She didn’t look up.

He was watching her. Again. Couldn't help it. Every time she leaned forward, her jacket shifted just enough to show the smooth curve of her collarbone. How a woman could look so regal and so dangerous at the same time, he couldn’t figure out.

After a long stretch of silence, he cleared his throat and said softly, “You ever gonna tell me where you learned all this?”